GPAS Support Group Session on 16 February 2008

first ever World Glaucoma Day

March 6th, 2008 will be the first ever World Glaucoma Day (WGD), a joint global initiative of the World Glaucoma Association (WGA) & the World Glaucoma Patient Association (WGPA).

Because glaucoma is a progressive disease causing irreversible visual loss, usually without warning until relatively advanced, and because 50% of affected people in the developed world (up to 90% in developing countries) do not know that they have the disease and are therefore not on treatment, community awareness needs to be significantly increased. This includes awareness of the disease and of the need to have regular eye checks, thereby permitting earlier detection and avoidance of what should be preventable visual disability.

This is the ultimate Goal of the World Glaucoma Day: To enhance global glaucoma awareness through novel as well as through traditional or novel communication strategies and events.

Rather than have a single large event held in conjunction with a major Ophthalmic conference, World Glaucoma Day was designed to be the sum total of local activities aiming at increasing glaucoma awareness, such as newspaper articles, radio and television coverage, public glaucoma "screening" campaigns in public places and "open-door" days at glaucoma clinics and departments of ophthalmology. Hundreds of activities have been planned around the World.